


Memories Of Who We Were

by Ophelia_Yvette



Series: They Were Still His Kids [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:42:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27314989
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ophelia_Yvette/pseuds/Ophelia_Yvette
Summary: Katie has been saying for years that Ben and his mother weren’t in a car accident. When Ben starts getting headaches and his memories are called into questions, he just might believe her.Not everything is as it seems, that much Ben is certain.
Relationships: Ben Braeden & Lisa Braeden, Lisa Braeden & Katie Doolittle, past Dean Winchester/Lisa Braeden
Series: They Were Still His Kids [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1994377
Comments: 1
Kudos: 37





	Memories Of Who We Were

**Author's Note:**

> Ben and Lisa really should have gotten their memories back
> 
> ————————————————
> 
> 12/23/20: Due to the creation of the ‘small claims’ copyright tribunal I feel I must reiterate that this is a work of fan fiction using characters from Supernatural, which is trademarked by The CW. Furthermore, I do *not* profit financially from the creation and publication of this story. It is for entertainment only and is not part of the official story line!

The first thing Ben remembered of his old life was that they hadn’t been in a car accident. He and Katie had been walking home from school when he’d remembered; triggered by a headache that had gotten increasingly worse throughout it the day. 

It felt like something inside him was cracking skull open like an egg. 

“We weren’t in a car accident,” Ben breathed suddenly, clutching his head. “were we?”

Strangely, he began to feel a little better with that admission. 

Katie Doolittle-Braeden, as she’d come to be know after her mother was institutionalized, simply looked at her brother with a clarity he’d never seen before. She’d been insistent, one upon a time after she was adopted by Lisa, that thing weren’t what they seemed. She stared at Ben in something akin to shock and, strangely enough, relief. 

“So you believe me.” Katie said eyeing her brother concernedly, “That we were taken by changelings?”

He huffed in response. 

Ben remembered the way his mother’s eyes had slowly been consumed by darkness. It was literally like someone was blocking out the light of her eyes, like a solar eclipse. He could still see the way her face twisted into an unnatural smile and could hear the way her voice, which was her own, didn’t sound like her. 

“If you’d believe that we were attacked by a demon.” He replied seriously, “And that’s how mom got into the hospital.” 

Katie and Ben stood there on the sidewalk a moment, digesting the information. Changelings were real and so were demons… did that mean everything else was too? Katie had never been privy to what happened to Lisa and Ben after her mother’s institutionalization. 

It was something they just never really discussed. 

“Are you going to tell Lisa?” Katie hedged worriedly. 

Ben shook his head.

“No.” He said with a frown, “She’s happy, truly happy, for the first time in I don’t know how long. I don’t want to mess that up, ya know?” 

Katie nodded sympathetically. 

“Well, why don’t we go inside and get some dinner?” She said as she walked up to the front door of their house, “And I’ll tell you what I remember.” 

Ben nodded and followed behind his sister into the house. When they got inside he wasn’t surprised to find the place empty. After moving to back to Cicero, his mother had gone back to school to get her nursing degree. She was worked long hours, most of them at night, but she was happier than he’d seen her in a long time. 

“What’s for dinner?” He quipped as he entered the kitchen only to nearly be smacked in the face with a book. 

“Read this.” His sister said simply, as if she hadn’t almost assaulted his person. 

Ben held the book gingerly in his hand, turning it over with a familiarity that nagged at him. 

“ _Supernatural _by Carver Edlund…What’s this?”__

____

____

“It’s a book all about your missing Dad and his brother.” 

Katie then sat down at the table as if she hadn’t just dropped a bomb on his life. How could she jump from demons and changelings being real to the Supernatural books being real and his dad is one of the main characters? 

Ben felt another headache coming on and he did not want to deal with that. 

“So what?” Ben sighed as he sat down at the table opposite her, “I get a headache and remember my mom was possessed by a demon… that doesn’t make the main character of this book my dad.” 

“Really?” Katie scoffed, “That’s what your going with?” 

“Yeah,” Her brother replied moodily. “What of it?” 

“Are you forgetting that there were strange satanic symbols painted in various places around your old house?” She replied plainly, “Not to mention your neighbors, myself included, insisting that your mom’s last boyfriend moved in with you for about a year?” 

Ben looked down at the table at that, deep in thought. She was right, nothing had made sense since the accident. Katie had insistent that it wasn’t an accident at all and that it was related to the paranormal. However, she’d stopped trying to press the issue when she saw how much it upset him and his mother. 

Now though, with this headache, everything he knew was starting to become less and less clear. 

“Your not wrong.” He muttered softly.

It had been strange that neither he nor his mother could remember the name of said boyfriend or what he looked like.

“But how do you know it’s him?” 

Ben jabbed finger on the cover of the Supernatural book. 

“Because he saved my life—“ His sister replied as she reached out and placed a hand on one of Ben’s own. 

Suddenly, he gasped in pain clutching his head as shut his eyes. Katie rounded on the table, calling out to him but Ben couldn’t hear her over the ringing in his ears. She sounded so far away, and the room felt like it was spinning until it felt like he was no longer in his kitchen. 

When Ben opened his eyes again, after the headache had subsided, he gasped. The feeling of not being in his kitchen wasn’t metaphorical, it was literal. He was now in some sort of basement but it most certainly wasn’t the one in this house, nor the ones in Battle Creek or Cicero. 

“Hello?” He called out cautiously. “Is anybody there?”

Ben looked around and gasped again when he caught sight of his reflection in a puddle. He couldn’t have been more than eight years old! Which meant that he somehow travelled back in time to 2011 or something…but that couldn’t be right? 

Time travel wasn’t possible unless… unless it wasn’t time travel at all. 

“Katie?” He called out worriedly, “This isn’t funny. Did you spike my Gatorade or something?” 

When he got no response from his sister, he tried to look around see if he could recognize anything. Ben could see other small kids in cages like him, hell, he could even see Katie. However, it didn’t seem like she could see or hear him. 

Nothing was making sense, where was he? 

“Ben.” An unfamiliar, yet somehow familiar, voice called out to him. 

“Who’s there.” He called back, fear lacing his voice. “They need help.” 

_I need help._

____

____

Suddenly, Ben saw a man with brown hair and green eyes, walking towards him looking frantic. He was stuck by the resemblance between them, so much so that he backed away in shock. Why did this man seem so familiar? 

“Who are you?” He snapped before regaining his senses, “Where am I?” 

“Ben... Ben... it's okay. I'm gonna get you out of here, okay?” The man said sounding genuinely worried, “Its gonna be ok.”

It seemed like Ben couldn’t ask anything, and get a response, that he hadn’t already lived out. He watched as the man opened his cage and pulled him out and into his arms. Ben hugged him back instinctively, feeling safe in this man’s embrace. 

“Come on. Let's go.” The man said as he set Ben down and ruffled his hair, “All right, come on.”

It’s only after Ben helped this man break out the other kids that he got an answer as to his identity. It was in the form of another man Ben also felt was strangely familiar. He was taller than his savior, with long brown hair and brown eyes. 

“Dean.” The man said and then he couldn’t hear anything after that as another headache was coming on. 

The room started spinning again and Ben reached out to Dean for support. He hands seemed to go right through him as the scene started to spinning like a tornado. Suddenly, he was working on a classic car with Dean laughing over something he’d said. Then the scene changed to Dean painting all those symbols, demons wards, his brain reminded him, on the walls. And then finally he was in the hospital, with the angel Castiel. 

The angel had his hand on Ben’s own forehead and was talking to him. Castiel was telling him that Dean was really his father and that this was going to keep him safe…And then everything shattered and the world went dark. 

Ben bolted upright on the couch, gasping for air like a drowning man. He looked around frantically only to see Katie looming over him, looking downright terrified. He seemed to relax a little when he realized he was in their house in Harlan and not eight years old. 

He placed a handover his chest as if to confirm he was really back. 

“Hey slow down!” His sister chastised him worriedly, fretting over him. “You were our for like an hour. You just suddenly collapsed and I—.” 

“It’s real.” He mumbled hoarsely, as he struggled to sit up. “You were right, it’s all real. The changelings, the demon possession, _Dean _, its all true.”__

____

____

Katie started at her adoptive brother with a mix of relief and concern. His face was pale and he was sweating profusely. He looked like he’d just run a marathon. She sat down beside him on the couch and placed a hand over his forehead. 

“Well, your temperature’s gone down.” She sighed in relief, “Ben, you just suddenly passed out and I was so worried—“

“I was reliving a memory.” He relied breathing heavily, “Multiple memories I think. When I first remembered the demon possession, I think it opened up the floodgates for everything else.” 

“So you remember—“

“ _Everything _.”__

____

____

Silence lapsed between the siblings as Ben absorbed this knowledge. Dean _really _was his Dad and he’d left because he thought it would keep him and his mother safe. Apparently it worked, because nothing had come after him and his mother since.__

____

____

He frowned as he remembered the demon possessing his mother, the changeling episode, and Katie’s summarization of the Supernatural books. All those breadcrumbs were connecting themselves in his mind. His own memories and the things he learned about his father were coming together to give him a more complete picture of the man called Dean Winchester. 

It was all real — his _father _fought monsters for a living.__

____

____

“I guess your kinda like the superboy to Dean’s Superman.” Katie ventured with a smile and a nudge, trying to be lighthearted. 

Ben shrugged but nevertheless smiled at his sister. 

“I guess I am.” He replied as Katie turned to him looking serious. 

“What do you want to do now?”

If Ben was being honest with himself he wasn’t exactly sure. Of course he wanted answers, that was only natural. However, he didn’t want to upset his mother and the life they’d built. He and Katie were just about to graduate high school and begin the rest their lives. Maybe once they graduated he could use that as an excuse to go looking. 

Maybe even follow in his father’s footsteps. 

“Do you wanna take a road trip this summer?” He ventured unsurely but was relieved when Katie grinned. 

“I’ll get my laptop.” She beamed as she sprang to her feet, “Operation Find Dean is a go.” 

Ben watched her go with a sad smile on his face. He’d thought she was crazy in the beginning, spouting nonsense about monsters and hunting. His mother had chalked it up the trauma she’d experienced under her mother and her being institutionalized. But now, he knew the truth. 

She wasn’t crazy and monsters were real. 

What a great way to spend his Friday night; in the span of a couple hours he’d learn that his memories had been altered by an angel in his father’s misguided attempt to save him and his mother. This must be just another Tuesday for his father and his brother but it was absolutely mind blowing for Ben. 

“Ben. Katie.” His mother called as the front door opened, “I’m home.” 

Ben immediately got up off the couch to greet his mother, not wanting to clue her in on his discovery. While she believed all of Katie’s ramblings were her imagination, he knew that she still thought something was off. He knew she willfully ignore it but Ben also knew she couldn’t do it forever. 

He didn’t want to ruin the life she’d built here with this knowledge. His mother was happy here in Cicero, happier than he’d seen her since Dean had lived with them. He wanted her to stay that way. However, life doesn’t always go the way you want. 

As Ben scampered out of the living room, passing his mother on his way up the steps. He ran past her so fast he didn’t catch her pause. Their shoulders brushed for a fraction of a second but it was a enough to trigger something in Lisa. She blinked before shaking her head, trying to shake off this weird feeling she was having. 

She walked into the living room and sighed as she sat down on the couch. She moved to grab the remote but instead she grabbed Supernatural. Lisa’s revelation however, was not as mind blowing as Ben’s had been. 

In reality, her memories had never really gone away. Everyday since Castiel had sealed them within the recesses of her mind she’d been reliving that year of her life in her dreams. Of course she could never quite remember them when she awoke but the oddness of them never quite left her. 

Picking up the book, the only way you would have noticed a change in Lisa’s demeanor was her ever-tightening grip. Her eyes were drawn to the name on the back cover, one that had been on the tip of her tongue for years but she could never quite remember. 

_Dean Winchester _. That was it. Her _boyfriend _. The father of her son.____

_____ _

_____ _

“Lisa?”

She looked up at the sound of her name to see Katie looking at her concernedly from the kitchen door way. She became keenly aware of what the girl had been saying to her for years. She very much owed her daughter an apology. 

“Yes?” 

“Are you ok?” 

Lisa glanced at the book before she quickly set it down. With a weary sigh she got to her feet and opened her arms for the girl. Katie obliged her and wrapped her arms around Lisa’s waist. 

“I am now.” She breathed, feeling a weight lifting off her shoulder. “I’m sorry.” 

“I know.” Katie replied and paused for a moment before speaking again. “He knows.” 

“Good.” Lisa said as they broke apart, placing a hand on Katie’s cheek. “Why don’t we go out to eat tonight? I’m thinking Frankie’s?” 

Katie beamed. 

They really only when to Frankie’s pizzeria when they were celebrating something. 

“I’ll go tell Ben,” Katie said as she ran out of the room, pausing in the doorway. “ _everything _.”__

____

____

Lisa smiled softly at her. 

“Thank you.”

**Author's Note:**

> This first fanfic I’ve ever posted! It’s taken me years to get to this point, to have the confidence to do this. Thank you eveyone one who reads this, leaves kudos, or comments. It truly means the world to me. :)


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